UncleGeoff – SFcrowsnesthttps://www.sfcrowsnest.info
Genre media for your inner geek.Fri, 24 May 2019 14:47:17 +0000en-US
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1 39814102Knight (A Chronicle Of Sibyl’s War book 2 of 3) by Timothy Zahn (book review).https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/knight-a-chronicle-of-sibyls-war-book-2-of-3-by-timothy-zahn-book-review/
https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/knight-a-chronicle-of-sibyls-war-book-2-of-3-by-timothy-zahn-book-review/#respondFri, 24 May 2019 13:58:05 +0000https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/?p=41840If you kept up with my review of ‘Pawn’ this month, the sequel ‘Knight’ was released this year. Nicole Hammond is both a Sibyl and Protector on the alien starship Fyrantha. Her selection and abduction to this role is based on her ability to communicate with the starship when she doses herself with a throat spray.

I’m a bit puzzled why she thinks using it will slowly kill her when last book it was revealed that Plato had poisoned particular aerosols so the Sibyls never reveal Man are suitable warriors for the Shipmasters. There are a species pitting teams of alien species against each other to determine information to sell to other aliens as slave mercenaries. As Nicole is a recovering alcoholic, maybe she forgot.

Anyway, she is exploring the various layers of her sector of the enormous starship when she discovers a lost Ghorf, a not so bright but strong alien belonging to a Quadrant 2 repair team. Getting him home means crossing another war arena and sorting out their lack of food problem because the Shipmasters use it as a means to force them to combat for the machines.

Things aren’t helped that the Shipmasters have taken two human repair teams to test in combat now they discovered they can fight and it’s up to Nicole to save them, none of which is helped by the fact her now nemesis Bungie is in charge of the opposing team. If the Shipmasters realise how combative humans are then Earth’s location will be revealed at a price to other aliens who will take them into combat slavery.

The Fyrantha’s original purpose was to be some form of zoo although you do have to wonder at what kind of menagerie they would have selected. There is also a grey area concerning the butterfly-like Wisps who can travel to other planets to kidnap staff when the Fyrantha itself cannot go back.

For a middle book where you normally expect a holding pattern to embellish detail, ‘Knight’ actually grows the reality and develops everything with a lot of surprises and spoilers, hence me stopping the synopsis above. I do wonder how the Shipmasters got so much control considering that there doesn’t appear to be that many of them in this mile-long starship, although part of that depends on what they got access to. Then again, there aren’t that many repair teams neither so I doubt if they can rebel. There is some inkling of where the third book will go but I suspect author Timothy Zahn will point in some other directions along the way.

The BFI tell us that Lady Lee, Sir Christopher Lee’s widow, has donated his photographic archive, to the BFI National Archive. The collection offers an insight into one of British Cinema’s most recognisable stars, who would have been 97 years old on 27th May 2019, consisting of photographic prints and albums collected and compiled by Sir Christopher Lee himself.

Spanning his entire film career this photographic archive includes a number of previously unseen on-set stills and contact sheets as well as photographic portraits from many of his roles including Dracula (1958) and its sequels, The Wicker Man (1973) and The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001).

From one of the actor’s earliest film roles in the Ealing Studios classic Scott of the Antarctic (1948), right up to his work in the 2000s, the Sir Christopher Lee Archive serves up a unique first-person account of a prolific career, and features previously unseen annotated musings, revealing his crisp, dry humour.

Other films represented in this collection include Hammer classics such as The Mummy (1959), Rasputin the Mad Monk (1966) and The Devil Rides Out (1967) as well as The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1971), Sleepy Hollow (1999) and Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith (2005).

At the heart of the archive are three album/scrapbooks put together in the early 1970s and annotated (often amusingly) by Lee himself, spanning the years 1948-1972. Album one covers Lee’s first decade and a half as an actor. Some of his earliest roles include World War II drama They Were Not Divided (1950) and Captain Horatio Hornblower (1950) in which Lee played supporting parts (his annotation to They Were Not Divided quips “back to camera, as usual”). He spent ten years honing his craft in supporting roles before his breakthrough performance as The Creature in Hammer Studios’ The Curse of Frankenstein (1957).

Lee at one time held the Guinness World Record for the most on-screen sword fights. This album records an early and memorable example: Lee’s infamous sword fight with Errol Flynn in The Dark Avenger (1955) in which Flynn accidentally cut through Lee’s little finger. The album also includes a striking pair of portraits of Lee, almost unrecognisable, during his screen test for John Huston’s Moby Dick (1956), a part ultimately played by another actor.

Album two spans the 1960s, including horror classics Dracula Price of Darkness (1965) and The Devil Rides Out (1967) and showing Lee alongside fellow horror legends including Peter Cushing (The Skull, 1965), Vincent Price (The Oblong Box, 1959) and Boris Karloff (The Curse of the Crimson Altar, 1968) as well as on set with Hammer director Terence Fisher. Lee’s appearance in two separate series of popular TV programme The Avengers (in 1967 and 1969) are also captured here.

Album 3 covers a shorter period, from Julius Caesar (1970) to Death Line (1972). It showcases some of the special make-ups deployed in films such as The Scars of Dracula (1970) and also includes images from I, Monster (1971), which Lee once described as ‘one of the best things I’ve ever done’, as well as a number of behind-the-scenes stills from Billy Wilder’s late masterpiece (and one of Lee’s favourite films), The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1971).

Alongside the iconic images showcased in the albums, there are some surprising, funny and interesting choices, many previously unseen. Lee felt typecast for much of the period covered by these albums, but they nevertheless show his great versatility as an actor across a variety of characters, films and genres. They are all the more special for being selected, arranged and annotated by Lee himself.

Lady Gitte Lee said, “It was a great joy and an honour for my husband when he was awarded the BFI Fellowship in recognition for his lifelong contribution to the industry. I am therefore delighted that the BFI are helping to preserve the heritage of his legacy, by bringing Christopher’s photographic archive into the BFI National Archive. I am immensely proud of my husband’s achievements. One of Britain’s best-loved actors, he was a man who entertained audiences worldwide for more than 60 years. It gives me great pleasure that his photos will be seen and appreciated for generations to come.”

Nathalie Morris, Senior Curator – Special Collections, BFI said, “We’re delighted to have been entrusted with this marvellous group of photographs which were collected and kept by Christopher Lee, one of the all-time cinema greats. These images wonderfully demonstrate Lee’s versatility and charisma as an actor, taking us on a journey from his early small parts through to his starring roles and then beyond, as directors sought him out for high profile supporting roles and cameos. The albums are fascinating for being assembled by Lee himself, especially as they also include his occasional, wryly-observed, comments. The BFI National Archive is incredibly grateful to Lady Lee for this generous donation.”

Lee’s collection will join other significant personal archive collections including those of Alfred Hitchcock, Alan Parker, David Lean, Ken Loach and Dirk Bogarde atthe BFI National Archive John Paul Getty Jnr Conservation Centre in Berkhamsted, stored in optimal archival conditions. Once catalogued, the collection will be available to view by appointment, with selected material made accessible digitally through the BFI Reuben Library.

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https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/sir-christopher-lees-photographic-archive-donated-to-the-bfi/feed/041830Back Issue #113 July 2019 (magazine review).https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/back-issue-113-july-2019-magazine-review/
https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/back-issue-113-july-2019-magazine-review/#respondThu, 23 May 2019 13:59:41 +0000https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/?p=41808You know how it is. A new issue of ‘Back Issue’ arrives, ahead of # 112 which arrived a couple days later, and instead of just reading the opening article, I ended up reading 20 pages in my first sitting. As the cover shows, this issue covers the 1989 ‘Batman’ film and it’s hard to believe 30 years has passed since it came to our screens. Executive producer Michael Uslan points out that he and Benjamin Melniker bought the rights for ‘Batman’ off DC Comics and it took 10 years to get the film made simply because the various Hollywood studios didn’t see any future in super-hero films.

Then we get to scriptwriter Sam Hamm who took the nascent script and made it darker and changed the focus from the hero to the villain and the casting of Jack Nicholson as the Joker, jolted to taking the offered part only when they were turning to Tim Curry to do the role. Now that would have been interesting. Seeing the flak Michael Keaton was getting as Batman, you would have to have wondered that had happened with Frank-N-Furter as the Joker. There’s a brief interview with Billy Dee Williams about his role as Harvey Dent, although he was only contracted for that film.

Getting writer/editor Denny O’Neil’s take into how he and artist Jerry Ordway’s comicbook adaptation of the film made shows how they got around getting the permission for actors’ likenesses right rather submit each art page.

The look at the Batman comicbooks from that period is also around the time that the Jason Todd/Robin was killed off. Although I agree with writer Jim Starlin’s comments that a sidekick in bright colours was asking to be killed off, I did wonder why he never tried a costume change to something darker. After all, Robin’s costume is a somewhat stylised answer to Robin Hood than the red-breasted bird. No one’s ever tried to do a brown-costumed Robin.

The success of the ‘Batman’ film also meant a resurrection of the ‘Batman’ newspaper strip for 21 months which owes more to the traditional comicbook version than the film. Problematically, it is also probably the last time it will ever appear in American newspapers as their sales drop.

Reading Mindy Newell’s interview as she revised Catwoman back in 1988 in the interview here tends to re-enforce the idea that Selina Kyle’s background is flexible enough to absorb any change and still have a similar outcome.

Oddly, after the ‘Crisis on Infinite Earths’, and the demise of Helena Wayne, the new Huntress as portrayed by Helena Bertinelli was less successful. I read both of them, each being drawn by Joe Staton, but given the choice I still liked Miss Wayne more. Stanton’s change in art style for Bertinelli, as shown in the samples here is a lot more like Will Eisner in style. With the way the New 52 has done, who knows, Helena Wayne might get resurrected one day. In the meantime, the article by Marc Buxton here will fill you in on the mobster’s daughter’s history. After all, she is in TV’s ‘Arrrow’ series now so you might want to see her roots.

Finally, a retrospective look at ‘Arkham Asylum’ written by Grant Morrison and painted by Dave McKean. I can’t for the life of me recall why I never read it at the time, although it is on my read list for sometime into the future.

The snapshot into the Batman based events of 30 years ago is bound to stir some memories for a lot of you. For those much younger, it should provide an interesting time capsule of the way things were changing in the post-Crisis reality of DC Comics.

]]>https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/back-issue-113-july-2019-magazine-review/feed/041808Escape Velocity – Three Days of Science And Science Fiction – at the Gaylord 2019.https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/escape-velocity-three-days-of-science-and-science-fiction-at-the-gaylord-2019/
https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/escape-velocity-three-days-of-science-and-science-fiction-at-the-gaylord-2019/#respondWed, 22 May 2019 15:16:35 +0000https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/?p=41785WHAT:

Escape Velocity 2019

WHEN:

Friday, Saturday and Sunday, May 24 through 26

WHERE:

Gaylord National Resort in Fort Washington, MD

DESCRIPTION:

The event is a futuristic world’s fair to promote informal STEAM educational activities within the context of science fiction using the fun of comic cons and fascination of science and engineering festivals.

PROGRAMMING:

Escape Velocity features a variety of programming throughout the open hours of the show. Friday sessions run from 10:00 a.m. until past Midnight; Saturday show hours start at 9:00 a.m. and conclude with a Midnight film showing of Plan Nine from Outer Space and Sunday runs from 9:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m. Features include celebrity guest appearances; panels and sessions spanning a broad spectrum of science fiction and STEAM genres; gaming competitions; a film festival and photo ops in legendary sci-fi environments; among others. For a full schedule of hours and events, please visit https://escapevelocity.events/programs.

Escape Velocity 2019 seeks to make a measurable positive impact to boost informal learning on the more conceptually challenging academic areas. Escape Velocity’s mission is to attract young people to science, technology, engineering, art, and math by producing and presenting the most compelling, exciting, educational, and entertaining science festival in the United States using science fiction as its primary engine.

WHO:

Escape Velocity is a partnership between the Museum of Science Fiction and NASA.

TICKETS:

Three-day weekend pass tickets, priced $30 for youths (aged 11-16), $50 for adults and $100 for the full VIP treatment, are available through the Escape Velocity website or onsite at the Gaylord Convention Center. Ten-dollar PAY IT FORWARD tickets allow patrons to donate a single-day admission for an underserved youth in the Washington, DC metro area. For tickets or additional information, please visit https://escapevelocity.events.

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https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/escape-velocity-three-days-of-science-and-science-fiction-at-the-gaylord-2019/feed/041785Doctor Who: Timelash by Glen McCoy (DVD TV series review).https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/doctor-who-timelash-by-glen-mccoy-dvd-tv-series-review/
https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/doctor-who-timelash-by-glen-mccoy-dvd-tv-series-review/#respondWed, 22 May 2019 13:59:12 +0000https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/?p=41781The TARDIS detects and is drawn into a time corridor/vortex/whatever. The Doctor (actor Colin Baker) detects its destination on Earth and with a bit of effort travels up it to where it came from, the planet Karfel. He explains to Peri (actress Nicola Bryant) that he had been here in an earlier regeneration, later revealed to be an untold tale of the Pertwee Doctor and Jo Grant.

Things have changed and the population is in the thrall of the Borad (actor Robert Ashby). Any rebels are thrown into the timelash, the very time corridor the TARDIS travelled through. They even saw Vena (actress Jeananne Crowley) pass them with the amulet of power. The previous leader, Maylin Renis (actor Neil Hallet) had just been killed by the Borad and his replacement, Maylin Tekker (actor Paul Darrow) is far more ruthless.

He succeeds in dividing up the Doctor and Peri, forcing the former to take the TARDIS to Earth to retrieve the amulet or his companion will be killed. Peri is already being lined up to be killed but escapes into the tunnels of the rebels but is recaptured. The Doctor succeeds in collecting Vena, but inadvertently also brings Herbert (actor David Chandler) from that time period as well. Presumably, the amulet gave Vena safe passage rather than be killed like the others.

Unfortunately, Tekker reveals his true colours and orders the Doctor into the timelash but is literally stopped by a mirror and then the real rebellion begins, with Tekker fleeing. The Borad orders Peri back into the caves for her own fate. The Doctor, with the help of the rebels retrieves crystals from the timelash and creates a couple devices to aid their cause. They also have an extra matter of the Bandrils from the nearby planet being forced into war when the Karfelons were ordered not to supply them with stock anymore by the Borad. His own agenda is to annihilate everyone. How? Well, that’s why you have to buy your own copy.

Oddly, there is little in the way of extras. First, we have the traditional audio commentary with actors Colin Baker, Nicola Bryant and Paul Darrow. Baker reveals that the story is not highly regarded by fans, mostly because script editor Eric Saward was away for 6 weeks writing the next story, ‘Revelation Of The Daleks’. ‘Maylin’ also doesn’t mean leader but father. The episode was also 9 minutes too long and the character bits were cut.

Darrow points out that he modelled his character on Richard III but was denied a hump. Bryant points out that her costume was made on a model of singer Sheena Easton with a bra. In contrast, the second episode was too short and the scene on the TARDIS with Peri and Herbert was written by Eric Saward and added while filming the next story.

‘The Good, The Bad And The Ugly’, running at 25 minutes, covers the background of the story. Eric Saward points out the problem of getting new writers that John Nathan-Turneer wanted and their backgrounds having problems in writing soaps working against them. Scriptwriter and newcomer Glen McCoy fulfilled this without said background although had to do a re-write because he had used the Daleks. The analysis is interesting and I tend to go along with Saward that if people add ‘dislike’, it’s a bigger struggle to say otherwise. I certainly didn’t think it any worse than any of the other classic ‘Doctor Who’ stories, but more of that below.

The ‘Photo Gallery is about 9 minutes long and features a lot of black & white photos and although there is a set gallery, little behind the scenes material.

There are a lot of threads in this story. It’s a musical chairs who actually is the head of the Karfelons, with leaders being ruthlessly killed along the way. If anything, it’s more amazing that anyone wants the job. The make-up for the Borad is also one of the most successful of the pre-CGI shows. None of them noticed that the constellation maps was something you could buy in shops at the time.

An odd thought occurred to me had Peri been returned to Earth now, she would be a couple years older than when she left and how would she explain that to her parents. Something occurred to me about this Doctor’s clothes is if you compare them to what the Time Lords wore, there’s certainly an element of bad colour taste compared to other species so maybe they see differently to them. You also have to wonder if the Borad is the same creature that the Zygons controlled and called the Skarasen in Loch Ness. Certainly, there is a resemblance.

This story is not highly regarded by the fans although I thought it quite reasonable. One can only hope history is more kind.

]]>https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/doctor-who-timelash-by-glen-mccoy-dvd-tv-series-review/feed/041781Doctor Who: Attack Of The Cybermen by Paula Moore (DVD TV series review).https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/doctor-who-attack-of-the-cybermen-by-paula-moore-dvd-tv-series-review/
https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/doctor-who-attack-of-the-cybermen-by-paula-moore-dvd-tv-series-review/#respondThu, 16 May 2019 11:59:13 +0000https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/?p=41678I often wondered when ‘Doctor Who’ was turned into 2 * 45 minute episodes that producer John Nathan-Turner was trying to stay a step or two ahead of inquisitive fans by doing something unexpected. The biggest step was giving more storytime per episode because there were fewer recaps which confirms my suspicions in the first of the extras. Even so, back in the day, it did feel like I was being short-changed a bit from having an adventure on two days than four or more episodes.

There are several strands to this ‘Doctor Who’ story. In the London sewers in 1985, two surveyors are killed underground.

In the TARDIS, the Doctor (actor Colin Baker) is attempting to repair the chameleon circuit although Peri (actress Nicola Bryant), eating a fresh apple she found somewhere, is trying to convince him he needs to rest after his regeneration as he still keeps calling her different companion names.

On Earth, Lytton (actor Maurice Colbourne) is leading a gang into doing a diamond raid on a bank via the sewers while his two policemen guards look on. What they don’t know is there is a real undercover police officer is in the gang. Lytton’s also tripped an intergalactic SOS, unknowing that it would attract a certain Time Lord. Actor Terry Malloy plays Russell the undercover detective and one of Lytton’s gang and one of the rare times you see him as human than as a Sontaran or Davros.

The TARDIS arrives at 76 Totters Lane (the second time in his long life) and the Doctor is determined to locate the SOS. His attempts to get the chameleon circuit to work has some unusual results. Realising that the signal is beaming beamed all around London, he uses the TARDIS to locate the signal.

On Telos, there is a rebellion of sorts of two human prisoners who are planning their own escape. Incidentally, the Cyber Controller (actor Michael Kilgarriff) seems to have eaten too many doughnuts compared to the rest of his team.

Meanwhile, Lytton’s group encounters the Cybermen and he surrenders to them and saves Griffiths (actor Brian Glover) life. The latter doesn’t really believe the Cybermen are real but mostly behaves himself. Lytton and the Cyberleader (actor David Banks) realises they have a mutual enemy in the Doctor. They get into the TARDIS and do a surprise attack on the Doctor and Peri, whom they deem expendable. The Doctor saves her by saying he will pilot the TARDIS to Telos for them. During the trip, he slowly discovers that Lytton’s loyalties are not quite what they seem.

How much more to say without going too spoiler. The Cyber Controller has problems reviving his people from deep freeze, not realising that that its original inhabitants, the Cryons, who live in sub-zero temperatures, have been sabotaging things. The Cybermen have already acquired one time machine but haven’t mastered it enough for their plan to stop their original home planet, Mondas, being destroyed the following year. An event that that an earlier regeneration of the Doctor was involved in and a major event in history that shouldn’t be changed. How, you’ll have to watch for yourself.

The audio commentary for the first episode is with actors Colin Baker, Nicola Bryant and Terry Malloy. Information given includes just who was writer Paula Moore and the explanation dismisses any idea of ‘her’ being the first female writer on ‘Doctor Who’. Baker received 150 cat badges from fans and used each of them in his performance in the ‘Doctor Who’ stage play. There’s also a comment on how did the two tired escapees on Telos so easily behead two Cybermen. Without getting too spoiler, considering what they were, they would certainly have the strength to do it.

The second episode loses Terry Malloy and has actress Sarah Berger, who played the Cryon Rost in his place. Colin Baker reveals he’s not keen on people who are taller than himself, a 6 footer himself, and also a fear of clowns. I can answer a couple questions they posed that they didn’t know the answers to. The Doctor’s tolerance to lower temperatures is largely because he also has a lower body temperature at 12C (80F) although even he shows his limits in the story.

Likewise, the reason why he was locked up with Flast (actress Faith Brown) with some deadly explosive was because it needed to be kept at low temperature and they didn’t think he had any means to raise its temperature. Considering that the Doctor didn’t even know what it was meant had he tried to escape, he would have died in the explosion. Sarah Berger explains that it was director Matthew Robinson who decided that the Cryons were to be feminine. Their ‘moustaches’ were to hide the fact that the plastic around the lips had to be cut out to allow them to speak.

Baker points out that he received a lot of flak for shooting the Cyber Controller but considering how many people the Davison Doctor shot, it does seem a bit late in the day.

Nearly 28 minutes is devoted to ‘The Cold War’ which examines the story from several points of view as well as the problems of dust and violence.

The 23 minute ‘Cyber Story’ focuses on the Cybermen and especially their creation and how extra budget made all the difference to their appearance.

The 8 minute ‘Human Cyborg’ is an interview with Professor Kevin Warwick who thinks upgrading to becoming a cyborg is likely to be changes to the brain and senses than limbs. As this was filmed in 2008, I think the latter is ahead at the moment.

There’s also 8 minutes of a ‘Photo Gallery’, which oddly doesn’t feature anything behind the scenes. There is also a 7 minute ‘Cyber Generation’ looking at photo stills from their first appearance in ‘The Tenth Planet’ to ‘Silver Nemesis’. Objectively, I always thought their look in ‘The Tomb Of The Cybermen’ was their best and probably why it sustained itself over so many series.

As Colin Baker points out, this was his first real story against a popular ‘Doctor Who’ villain and in a new story format back on Saturday night. I think it holds together well even today with an interesting balance of humour and action.

]]>https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/doctor-who-attack-of-the-cybermen-by-paula-moore-dvd-tv-series-review/feed/041678Pawn (A Chronicle Of Sibyl’s War book 1 of 3) by Timothy Zahn (book review).https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/pawn-a-chronicle-of-sibyls-war-book-1-of-3-by-timothy-zahn-book-review/
https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/pawn-a-chronicle-of-sibyls-war-book-1-of-3-by-timothy-zahn-book-review/#respondThu, 16 May 2019 09:59:40 +0000https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/?p=41675Drunkard and petty crook Nicole Hammon, along with injured thug Howard…sorry Bungie and a doctor, Sam McNair, about to be forced to stitch him up, are captured by aliens. They don’t really want Bungie or McNair because the prize is Nicole, but take as a group lot. With the help of a mouth spray, she can hear the messages of the alien starship, the Fyrantha, and acts as foreman guiding her team in repairs. Bungie and McNair would rather get home but they are already a long distance from home. Nicole’s title is a Sibyl which is a Greek name for an oracle and she’s amongst a small number of people with the gift to hear voices.

Bungie convinces Nicole to help him get behind a locked door and finds out that it is a battleground for two opposing species. He promptly gets injured and Nicole has to get McNair to patch him up while he stays in hiding. The Fyrantha, meanwhile, instructs Nicole to go back again where she learns the food machine for one species is giving out less food to encourage them to fight or starve. This is not helped when the males of one species have to starve their females and children.

However, both Nicole and us get a larger picture of what is really going on. Through one of her team, Nicole also learns that the life expediency for Sibyls isn’t long due to the use of the mouth spray until one of the species she is helping discovers something odd about them. That’s spoiler so you’ll have to read what happens for yourself. Suffice to say, the reason is actually logical but, even so, you would have thought the reason would have been explained to these Sibyls why they had to be careful than just kill them.

Writer Timothy Zahn’s writing style isn’t overtly complex and will beguile you into reading the story although the warm-up is a tad slow. The target audience is Young Adult and its only when people like me read and analyse that for streetwise young adults there is a distinct lack of profanity or slang.

In some respects, Nicole’s background as a petty crook isn’t explored as much as it should be and only rears its head when Zahn needs a certain background skill, like lying, than exploit it all the time. Nicole’s also an alcoholic and yet doesn’t go through any withdrawal symptoms on-board the starship to point out to her reader audience that it isn’t easy which is also a missed opportunity.

The story is readable and just a taste of things to come, which is the whole point of trilogies. Watch who you trust.

]]>https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/pawn-a-chronicle-of-sibyls-war-book-1-of-3-by-timothy-zahn-book-review/feed/041675The Case For Space by Robert Zubrin (book review).https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/the-case-for-space-by-robert-zubrin-book-review/
https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/the-case-for-space-by-robert-zubrin-book-review/#respondTue, 14 May 2019 11:59:07 +0000https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/?p=41657It’s rather interesting reading author Robert Zubrin’s biographic notes. He’s president of Pioneer Astronautics, president of the Mars Society and a former senior engineer for Lockheed Martin. His book, ‘The Case For Space’, is an examination of the commercial companies who are now getting into space. The initial focus is on Eon Musk and answers a question as to why doesn’t he and the likes of Jeff Bezos get together and combine resources. Simple. They don’t like not being in charge of everything. It comes down to ego and running companies but you do have to wonder about the potential for dictatorship and what should happen to their companies when they die.

Considering that Zubrin points out that the companies that supply NASA in the past have been administration heavy compared to the people on the ground floor building the hardware, Musk might actually have a point there in not adopting their model. More so, as his financial forecasts are bringing the costs of getting people into space at a fraction of what it currently costs America. Even Russia is going to have to have a rethink about the costs of their current spaceships to the International Space Station. This is repopulating the space industry showing that space flight is possible on a low budget and even with getting smaller satellites up there as a commercial enterprise, although no mention of how to handle the space junk that is currently in orbit.

Zubrin points out how Moon flights will be used to build up a colony, exploiting the ice at the poles and also the available helium-3 isotope for fuel. Part of me reading this thinks he’s being too idealised with no evaluation of any problems that could interrupt this happening. The Moon gets more meteorite damage than the Earth and with no atmosphere to burn up any of them. The use of a spacehook to transport equipment from orbit to the Moon won’t have to worry about the problems of atmosphere like it would with the Earth does seem viable although transporting the materials there is problematic. Meteorite damage to the Earth is covered in one of the later chapters but not addressed elsewhere.

He does point out the disadvantages of using the Moon as a way station for going to Mars which should make you think. The same with the plans for the materials in the Asteroid Belt. Although some of the problems with living in space is covered, even living on Mars is going to reduce your chances of returning to Earth with less body mass. If you’re planning to be a pioneer, then I think some more emphasis should have been placed at your chances of returning to Earth aren’t that good. Even more so for any children born on Mars in a lower gravity. It’s not as though I want to discourage people from wanting to go into space but I do find it worrying that this isn’t being addressed as it should. Even short stays on the ISS causes significant problems, let along a trip out to Mars and a third of the gravity there compared to Earth.

Going through the options for ever faster space travel is very old ground and you can go back even to the 1970s where they first got collected in books. Granted we know a lot more about the outer planets now to reserve judgement to use them as fuel resources but there are still some points Zubrin doesn’t cover adequately. Using frozen material still means expending energy to melt them for use and if you’re doing this on a frozen moon, it would be a real problem staying ahead all the time.

The main problem of using nuclear explosions in space to propel a spacecraft is it leaving radioactive particles in its wake and bearing in mind how planets attract matter down, radioactive contamination is not only dangerous for us but any neighbouring star system we investigate. It’ll take a while to sort out how we contaminate our planet with plastic but radioactive waste worldwide would be impossible to clean.

I’m less convinced that using solar sails outside of our star system. Beaming a laser at it takes a lot of power and unless it was diffuse would only hit part of the sail. There’s also a little matter of obstacles getting in the way so that even if it was possible, the beam could be defused too much and the sail getting damaged as well bearing in mind the size it would have to be to capture light. Slowing down would be the least of your problems.

Terraforming Mars and Venus would be very long-term projects. I’m still not sure how he proposes sorting out all that widespread sulphuric acid on Venus. Acidic soil would be hard to cultivate.

Zubrin points out how much America has been involved in getting into space to the exclusion of other countries and even forgets Russia and even the new boys on the block like China and India. For sorting out discoveries, I seem to recall we Brits had played our own part in discoveries and equipment. It’s hardly one-sided.

Please don’t treat this review as a total downer. If you need information about the types of space travel and even some of the maths, this is a useful book but he does play down some of the adverse effects to the human body and other long term problems. I’m all for more commercial companies with an inkling to get into space. In many respects, NASA has somewhat had a monopoly in the USA in preventing this happening, but commercial pressure and finance has changed that template. Will it encourage more pioneer-minded people to want to travel up there is something that needs to be built up, but not without some balance of the risks involved.

Set to run Friday, Saturday and Sunday, May 24th through 26th 2019 at the Gaylord National Resort in Fort Washington, MD, Escape Velocity will provide an inside look into the state of innovation, STEM education, and science fiction culture.

The event will feature a team of speakers, panellists and presenters from various industries and professions. Featured special guests are known for their work on such hit television and movie series as Star Trek, Star Wars, Alien, Dr. Who, The Expanse and others; while staff at institutions like NASA, scholars and researchers at higher education institutions, international entertainers and global entrepreneurs fill out the rest of the lineup.

Notable guests include:

Dominique Tipper— Tipper is a television and movie actor. She currently plays ‘Naomi Nagata’ in the Syfy network’s series The Expanse. Since launching her career in 2012, Dominique has appeared in several productions, including Warner Bros’ Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016), The Girl With All The Gifts (2016), and Vampire Academy (2014). Tipper adopted the role of producer and director with the creation of her first short film, Trying To Find Me (2018), and is now in the beginning stages of developing her first feature-length film.

Gigi Edgley — Edgley is an actress originally from Australia. Edgley has starred in numerous film and television series including FX’s Feud, USA’s The Starter Wife, Enuattii: Face off Designer’s latest feature, Diminuendo, Rescue Special Ops, Tricky Business, Syfy’s Showdown at Area 51, Quantum Apocalypse, Carlotta, Newcastle, Black Jack, Peacekeeper Wars, Stingers, Secret Life Of Us, Beastmaster, Lost World, Water Rats, Day of The Roses, Star Trek Continues, and Nexus. Gigi has helped to crowdfund over $100,000 for The Circuit and over $44,000 on Kickstarter to fund a sci-fi short called Hashtag. Edgley was nominated for best lead actress in the Film Critics Circle awards for her performance in Last Train to Freo, the Syfy Genre Award for Best Supporting actress, and the Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress in a television series.

Anwan Glover — Glover is an American musician, actor, and founding member of the DC-based go-go band Backyard Band. He is best known for his portrayal of “Slim Charles” in the HBO crime-drama television series The Wire. He can be seen in TV shows like Treme, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, and Scream Queens. In 2018, Glover was cast as Mikken in the science fiction film Prospect.

Dan Curry — Visual effects supervisor in various capacities for Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: Enterprise. Curry’s work has been recognised with seven Emmys (15 nominations) and a VES Award for Best Broadcast Visual Effects. Curry is a past VES Board member and a past Visual Effects Peer Group Governor of the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. He is also a member of DGA, ASC, and PGA.

Additional guests attendingare:

David Brin, PhD

Morgan Gendel

Marc Okrand

Kellie Gerardi

Mason Peck, PhD

Ghostbusters Tri-State Division

DJ Shaleigh

C. Alex Young, PhD

Eric Suggs, Jr.

Aisha Matthews

Iron Knight Cosplay

Jeff Rutenbeck, PhD

David Grinspoon, PhD

Escape Velocity features a variety of programming throughout the open hours of the show. Friday sessions run from 10:00 a.m. until past Midnight; Saturday show hours start at 9:00 a.m. and conclude with a Midnight film showing of Plan Nine from Outer Space and Sunday runs from 9:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m. For a full schedule of hours and events, please visit https://escapevelocity.events/programs. Three-day weekend pass tickets, priced $30 for youths (aged 11-16), $50 for adults and $100 for the full VIP treatment, are available through the Escape Velocity website or onsite at the Gaylord Convention Center. Ten-dollar PAY IT FORWARD tickets allow patrons to donate a single-day admission for an underserved youth in the Washington, DC metro area.

The nonprofit Museum of Science Fiction is the USA’s first science fiction museum, covering the history of the genre across the arts and providing a narrative on its relationship to the real world.

]]>https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/escape-velocity-where-science-meets-pop-culture-welcomes-industry-icons-24-26-may-2019/feed/041632Marvel Alpha Block: The Marvel Cinematic Universe From A To Z by Peskimo (book review).https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/marvel-alpha-block-the-marvel-cinematic-universe-froma-to-z-by-perkimo-book-review/
https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/marvel-alpha-block-the-marvel-cinematic-universe-froma-to-z-by-perkimo-book-review/#respondThu, 09 May 2019 09:59:54 +0000https://www.sfcrowsnest.info/?p=41604The long titled ‘Marvel Alpha Block: The Marvel Cinematic Universe From A To Z’ is the 6th book in Abrams ‘Block Books’. It is literally a block book with card pages, a couple of which fold out. Although the bumf says it’s for all ages, it is really designed for your youngest sprogs as the most text used is for naming the characters.

As the title says, it goes through the list of the film characters with simplistic art. If you’re going to indoctrinate them, get ‘em young although I’m not sure if they’d be old enough for the films just yet.

Oddly, it’s only the letter ‘B’ that gets multiple entries so poor Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver don’t. At the back of the book, there is a foldout of all the characters and you can send you sprogs wild as they try to locate the multiple picture entries of the characters throughout.